One of the questions I 'm asked most often is: how much does it cost to build a WordPress website? While Wordpress itself is free, the actual cost varies depending on your budget and goals. So here, I'll answer the question: How much does it cost to build your website using the Wordpress platform? I'll also guide you around the common traps that will cost you money.
The cost of a WordPress site can be broken down into the following categories:
Every website on the internet needs hosting. This is your website’s home on the internet. Next, you'll need a domain name. If you want something more advanced / custom, then you can purchase a premium Wordpress template or have one custom made which will raise the cost. There are 50,000+ free plugins for WordPress. These are apps and extensions for your websites. Think features like contact form, gallery, etc. So while you can build a website with just the hosting and domain cost, based on your situation, you may end up paying for additional tools and services. That’s why it’s often confusing for people to find out the real cost of a WordPress website. Let us walk you through the real cost of building a WordPress site. Estimating the Real Cost of Building a WordPress Site
Depending on your needs, your cost to start a WordPress website can range from $100 to $500 to $3000 for simple websites and up to 30,000 or more for complex business-level websites.
You can build a fully functional WordPress website for yourself and keep your costs under $100. Here is the cost break down of a WordPress website on a low budget. First, you will need a domain name and web hosting. A domain name typically costs $14.99 / year, and web hosting normally costs $7.99 / month. Thankfully, Bluehost, an official WordPress recommended hosting provider, has agreed to offer our users a free domain name and over 60% off on web hosting.→ Click here to Claim this Exclusive Bluehost offer ←For more hosting recommendations read our guide on how to choose the best WordPress hosting. Next, you will need to install WordPress on your hosting account. See our step by step guide on how to start a WordPress blog for complete instructions. Once you have installed WordPress, you can choose a design for your website using a free template. There are thousands of free and professionally designed templates available for WordPress that you can install. See our expert-pick of 43 beautiful free WordPress blog themes for some examples. Once you have chosen a WordPress template, follow the instructions in our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress theme. Next, you may want to add certain features to your website like adding a contact form, a photo gallery, a slider, etc. Don’t worry there are more than 40,000 WordPress plugins available that will help you do that. Plugins are like apps or extensions for your WordPress site. See our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin. Below is our selection of the essentials WordPress plugins that you should install on your website. All of them are available for free. Features
There are many more free WordPress plugins to add different features and extend your WordPress site. See our best WordPress plugins category where we have reviewed hundreds of WordPress plugins. Total Cost of the website: $46 – $100 per year. What’s the Cost of a WordPress Site(with More Features)?
We always recommend our users to start small and then add more features as their website grow. This way you will not be paying for anything that you don’t need. As you add more features to your website, your website cost will start to increase. You can continue to use Bluehost for WordPress hosting to keep the cost low and get a free domain name. However since you will be adding more features to your website, it may make sense to get a more powerful hosting configuration like SiteGround’s GoGeek plan. This will cost you a little more, but it comes with premium features like staging, faster performance, and can handle up to 100,000 visitors per month. You can use our SiteGround coupon to get 60% off for the first year of your hosting. You can also go for a premium WordPress template for your site. Unlike free WordPress templates, these templates come with extra features and priority support. See our expert selection of 40 best responsive WordPress themes for some great premium templates that you can use. For more website features you need to use a combination of free + paid plugin addons. Here are some essential premium WordPress plugins and extensions that you’ll need as your site grows: Features
MarketingSecurityThere are many more WordPress plugins and services that you can add. Each paid service or addon that you add will increase the cost of your WordPress site. The total cost of a website: Depending on the premium WordPress plugins and services that you add, it can be anywhere between $500 and $1000 per year. What’s the Cost of a WordPress Ecommerce Website?
WordPress powers millions of eCommerce websites around the world. The cost of building a WordPress eCommerce website can be significantly higher, but we will show you how to build a WordPress eCommerce website while avoiding potential losses and overspending. In addition to hosting and domain, your eCommerce site will also need an SSL certificate which costs around $69.99/year. SSL is required to securely transfer customer data such as credit card information, usernames, passwords, etc. We recommend using the Bluehost Ecommerce plan. It gives you a free domain and SSL certificate, plus a discount on hosting. After that, you need to select a WordPress eCommerce plugin. There are several eCommerce plugins for WordPress, but none comes even close to WooCommerce. It is the most popular WordPress eCommerce plugin that allows you to build robust online stores to sell your products/services. Next, you will need to install WordPress and WooCommerce on your website. We have a step by step guide on how to start an online store. While WooCommerce is free, you will need to use paid addons for additional features. The cost of your website will go up depending on how many addons you need to add on your website. Once you are up and running, you will need to choose a WooCommerce ready WordPress template for your site. There are several paid and free WordPress templates with full WooCommerce support. Choosing a premium or paid template gives you access to support and extra features. We have a list of the best free WooCommerce addons, but depending on your needs, you may have to use some paid extensions as well. Here are some other paid services that you’ll need on your eCommerce website. Features
MarketingSecurityRemember the best way to keep your costs down is by starting small and adding extensions and services as your business grows. The total cost of building a WordPress eCommerce website: $1000 – $3000. It could be higher depending on how many paid addons and services you add to your site.
